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During covid, while every corporation whined how tough times were (and often they really were), retail sellers in Europe like Tesco had record profits. Elevate
by jajko 2y ago
During covid, while every corporation whined how tough times were (and often they really were), retail sellers in Europe like Tesco had record profits. Elevated prices, excuses about supply chain, less workers on the fields etc. Their profits went through the roof, year after year.
Rewind to 2024, prices are even higher, their profits are still stellar. I have hard time feeling any sympathy towards them.
Its almost as if they somehow, big boys behind closed doors, made together some shady deals about overall prices (with which smaller guys can't still compete ie due to economies of scale or massive negotiating power). No, that can't happen in 2024, almost pretty sure about that.
- lotsofpulp 2y agoNominal profits have no place in this discussion. Only profit margin, and grocery businesses have profit margins of 2% or maybe 4%. Tesco has a less than 4% profit margin (they only list operating margin, I didn’t bother to calculate profit margin, but it must be lower), and the margins have not been increasing. Which means Tesco’s costs are increasing, necessitating Tesco’s price increases. Otherwise Tesco loses money. https://www.tescoplc.com/investors/reports-results-and-presentations/financial-performance/five-year-record/ https://www.tescoplc.com/investors/reports-results-and-prese... If you think you can run a better business on sub 4% profit margin, you are welcome to throw your hat in the ring. But it really is an achievement of modern technology, logistics, and management to enable to get the amount of food, from all over the world, in consumer’s hands, all year round, at such low profit margin.